Elections: Personation

Lord Rennard Excerpts

Tuesday 4th September 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Rennard]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the level of personation at elections in Great Britain.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, the Electoral Commission publishes information on allegations of electoral fraud at elections, including those of personation. In due course the Electoral Commission will publish a report covering polls held in 2018. On 3 May this year, pilots requiring voters to present ID before voting in person were held in five local authorities. In July, the Electoral Commission and Cabinet Office published their respective evaluations of the pilots.

[Lord Rennard (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister declined my invitation to the Government to assess the level of personation by contacting returning officers to see how many tendered ballot papers had been issued. So I asked the Electoral Reform Society to do the job. Using freedom of information requests, it received responses from 239 returning officers, showing that in the general election last year the total number of alternative ballot papers across those 239 council areas that had to be issued when someone turned up at a polling station and found that their name had been used to claim a vote, or perhaps that their vote had been given in error and the wrong name crossed off, was a mere 49. So what justification could there be for rolling out compulsory voter ID at all polling stations?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

My Lords, compulsory voter ID was recommended four years ago by the independent Electoral Commission. It has repeated that recommendation several times since. On the Electoral Commission sit representatives of all three parties, including the noble Lord’s own. I remind him that the chair of the Electoral Commission said on this subject last year:

“We have been pressing for this change”—


that is, voter ID—

“not because we believe that voting for someone else … is … a … problem now. But the opportunity for fraud of this kind is clearly there. We want to address this before it becomes a problem, and part of a wider reduction of trust in the system”.

He went on to say that to collect a parcel you have to produce ID, so it is reasonable that you should have to do so when you vote. He went on:

“Unfortunately this proposal risks becoming a political football”—


a sport unknown in your Lordships’ House.